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The first thing I did after the parade was head back to the TNT!MEN booth to pick up my stuff. Then I hopped in a taxi, went home, showered, and went to a performance of Angels in America -- the Pulitzer-Prize-winning play by Tony Kushner. What a knockout combination!
I then returned to my Bed & Breakfast guesthouse, exhausted but happy, and a bit apprehensive about how I would be greeted. I hadn't told anyone there just how I planned to march in the parade, and I hadn't let drop any nudist tendencies. So none of them knew to expect me in the nude contingent.
I was apprehensive because -- let's face it -- not everyone gay would agree with my actions that day. Not everyone is happy to see a heavyset guy with a hairy back strutting naked back and forth carrying a sign advocating the right to go naked. None of the other clients at the B & B had seemed erotically interested in "bears" in general, or in me in particular, so I certainly wasn't expecting anyone to tell me how sexy I looked, nor did I expect sex partners to be lining up at my door that night. Moreover, no one at the B & B had attended any of the naked events I'd attended in the previous few days, and none had given any signs that they might be naturists themselves.
I did expect two kinds of response, possibly three:
The actual response I got was so overwhelming, it nearly blew me away:
In awe!! As soon as I walked into the patio area, where they were having coffee, everyone turned around and locked their eyes onto mine. Then they couldn't stop paying me compliments. I was astonished! They were saying things like this:
"My friend nudged me and said hey look this next group's a bunch of nudists. And I turned and looked and there you were! I said, 'I know him! That guy's from my hotel!! We were just sooooo impressed that you had the nerve to do that in front of everybody." "We saw the main group go past, then we looked down the parade route and we saw you juggling your sign and the popsicle you just bought. Then you ran by so fast we couldn't get your attention. That was cool, man!"
"My friend nudged me and said hey look this next group's a bunch of nudists. And I turned and looked and there you were! I said, 'I know him! That guy's from my hotel!! We were just sooooo impressed that you had the nerve to do that in front of everybody."
"We saw the main group go past, then we looked down the parade route and we saw you juggling your sign and the popsicle you just bought. Then you ran by so fast we couldn't get your attention. That was cool, man!"
Moreover, this was not just a kind of now-I-know-someone-famous thing. They were really, really complimenting me for my courage. I aw-shucksed them a bit, saying that it was a lot less of a risk for me than for the Toronto fellows who have to live in the same city they marched in. But they wouldn't let me get away with that.
One fellow, one of the cutest and most party-oriented of the group, got everyone's attention and then told me -- firmly, forcefully, and in all seriousness -- "Look, I don't care if I was a million miles away from where I lived. I would never have had the nerve to do what you did! I just couldn't." And it was clear from the tone of his voice that he wanted to have the nerve that I showed that afternoon.
I wasn't expecting praise this high, so it took awhile for it to sink in, intellectually -- for me to be sure that they really meant what they said. It sunk in emotionally a bit quicker (which is just the opposite of the way things usually work for me, emotionally versus intellect). They liked me. They respected me!
I had marched for respect for my ideas. Their comments indicated that I had succeeded in getting my intellectual points across. I had marched nude to demonstrate, in my emotions and actions, that I had body acceptance. When one of them spontaneously suggested that I take my clothes off right there on the patio if I felt like it, I realized that I had enlightened, too. The combination was intoxicating.
In a sense, they had gotten the message behind why I marched naked better than I had. Before the march, "body acceptance" to me was a bunch of words. You hear this phrase all over the nudist world, in all their books and magazines. I agreed with it in a kind of ritualistic, intellectual way: it's not good to hate your body, you get naked because it feels good to yourself, not because it impresses other people, etc. But the thin acceptance of the concept I had before the march suddenly thickened. They thought I was courageous. They thought I accepted my body as it is. They were impressed.
And I thought, maybe I should be, too.
You know all those inspirational books that tell you that courage is not something that you have to have before you act courageously? You act courageously, and then you see that you had courage. If you want to do something that's difficult, which requires courage, don't wait for the courage to arrive first. It rarely does. You just do it -- you're an emotional mess beforehand so you get support and you practice and you do whatever you need to do to do it.
In short, you JUST DO IT. And I'd mention the athletic company that promotes that slogan if it weren't for the fact that they sell clothes.
A couple of weeks later I got to thinking about the cuties that just about every float had dancing on them. You know the type: Not one hair on the chest, perfect abdominals, gorgeous muscles, a tan, sunglasses to increase their attitude and the very highest quality -- uh, make that the most expensive -- white designer underwear. What risks did they run by dancing in the parade?
Several. The risk that someone might look down on them for wearing last year's fashionable undergarments. That someone would think that they weren't young enough, or cute enough, or smooth enough, or GQ-looking enough, or thin enough, or muscled enough. And their underpants and their bodies and their dancing showed that they knew that they were wearing the trendiest u-trou, that they had shaved their chests impeccably, that everyone would envy their muscles instead of criticize them.
And what were they fighting for by their dancing? The right to be open about who they are, and to be openly gay -- not something that I consider trivial, in spite of my comments to follow. But not much else. They were fighting for the right to be considered the belle of the ball until the next float came along. The right to be told that they're beautiful, until they hit 35 or drop their gym membership.
As I thought back about these dancers, some of whom I had lusted after myself at the time, it suddenly hit me. Let's suppose that some of them had had nasty thoughts about me. About my tummy, my age, my hairiness -- whatever. Before, I would have wanted them enough that I would at some level accepted their criticisms. But now I had the perfect retort:
Honey, you may have better abs but I've got more balls!
Or better yet:
Honey, through this whole parade everyone's had a look at your bathing suit and my crotch. And every naked step of the way I proved that I've got balls. So the next question is, do you?
Heh heh heh.
Heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh heh!! Prove it, you sniveling little mound of boyflesh!!
Sorry, I got carried away there. (grin) And hey, little quivering mound, if you think that some of my courage will be deposited in you if I fuck you, I'd be willing to give it a try. Do you live anywhere near San Diego (grin again)?
But seriously, guys, don't get me wrong. Some of those disco bunny types are just as much into nudity as I am. I should also point out that although it doesn't take tons of courage to march prominently in a gay pride parade these days, it does take some -- and for all I know, for some of the dancers it may have taken quite a lot. Not all of them would have tried to put me down, and maybe one or two of them even liked bears.
For me, the bottom line was this. After my joyful reception at the B & B, my self-esteem shot up. A week or two later, my body acceptance took a similar jump. I'll never be the same bear again.
Grrrrrrrrrrrr!
Since 6 August 1997.